That Triathlon Life Podcast - Indoor triathlon training, outdoor riding vs indoor riding, winter training camp locations, women's health, and more!

Episode Date: January 11, 2024

This week on the podcast we are all together in Bend, OR. We got to your questions about picking triathlon sponsors, pros interfering with each other's race,  form review, and more! To submit your own question, as well as become a podcast supporter, head over to ThatTriathlonLife.com

Hello, everyone. Welcome to That Traathlon Life podcast. I'm Paula Finley. I'm Mary Fulgisham. I'm Nick Goldston. And we are all together in Bend. We are on our 101st podcast. We did our 100th podcast recording last week, live with callers and craziness. This episode is going to be a little bit more normal. But really appreciate all the feedback. Seemed like it was a hit. Thank you, Nick, for editing it all night till 3 in the morning. Yeah. But yeah, it's been really fun. And we are backlogged with questions because last week we called people live for questions. So we got a lot of the email questions to do today. Yeah, I always have this sort of a feeling when I finish up a video project that I'm super excited about that I went extra hard on. I'm like hung over for the next week. And when it comes around time to make the next video, I'm kind of like, oh, okay, we're just doing what we're normally do back to a normal thing. But I don't know. It feels like. good. I'm excited to do a bunch of questions and have some fun. I feel like that feeling that you have, Eric, is even more intense since we're kind of snowed in right now. And we're just like, yeah,

no work, no school. We're just staying at home, playing guitar, sitting by the fire, hanging out. Training three times a day. Yeah, we're doing a little bit of work. You guys are nonstop filming stuff. We are. That's true. By the way, who are you guys? I don't even know who you are. Me and Eric are professional triathletes. Nick is a amateur triathlete, professional music. Musician soundmaster of the podcast. And that's why we feel qualified a little bit to answer some questions about triathlon. So the format of this is people email in questions. And if you have any questions, you can email us at that triathlonlifebrand.com.

No, that's wrong. Nick, you do it. You do it. I'm out of my element. I'm shaking my head. I love when you try to do that, though. No, if you have questions, you can go to that triathlon life.com slash podcast. Yes.

You're back in the year 2022. Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Okay, yeah, we got a special, like, forum on the website for the podcast questions. And there you can also become a podcast supporter. We did have a big influx in supporters last month, which is greatly appreciated. Welcome to all the new supporters. The only difference really is you'll get some perks and you'll be in the draw to win a bottle. And this week's winner is... Christian Salera from New Jersey. Yeah. The armpit of the USA. I'm just kidding. I'm from Long Island just across the water and it's just as armpity as New Jersey. I thought it was nice over there. It is actually New Jersey gets a bad rap, but it is really nice. David is from New Jersey and my friend running fast David and he loves New Jersey.

Joe, who I used to train with on the Traathlon Squad, Jersey Joe, was from New Jersey. The boss, Bruce Springsteen, New Jersey. There we go. What more do we need? If Christian can just email Nick or Instagram message Nick confirming the address you'd like us to send the bottle to then do that. And just a little, in case you're new here, we just randomly pick a person on a valve. of our supporters to win a bottle every week. And it's a small perk. The supporter feature is more to like, you know, support us week to week and because

you like listening. But we try to do a couple fun things occasionally to make it worthwhile. Yeah, the supportive thing, like we put in perks. And actually one of my New Year's resolutions this year is to add more value to the supporters. Yes. But it was born out of us trying to avoid doing ad reads. Yeah.

And still having the podcast. not be a money pit, you know? When we buy mics and I fly out here and we do videos and stuff. So we really appreciate that to everyone who is a podcast supporter. Okay, so I think we could just go on to questions. But first, I just wanted to say that it has been snowing a lot here. And we have been doing these epic runs in the snow that have been, the magical thing about it is that even though it snowed a ton, it's not that cold. So we're running out in the snow and not crazy gear and we're super comfortable. Yeah. Yeah, the temperature is not cold. But it's very wet snow.

Yeah. It's quite hard to run in. And I just think of it like trail running where your pace just doesn't matter because you're kind of sludging through it. Your heart rate's high, but your pace per kilometer or whatever is not fast. I feel like that's kind of a gift right now. It's like, yep, my pace is going to be low and it's not even my fault. I just am going to go out there and run and I'm not even going to think about the pace

too much. Yeah, I guess so. Something that Eric said too, though, about different kinds of snow you can run in, the worst kind of snow you can run in is when it's been it snowed people walked in the snow so there's footsteps then that snow kind of melted and then kind of froze into ice so those footsteps might as well be like slippery cement footsteps and you kind of like lock into them and slide out of them those are scary you know you just uh your foot locks into them and then your ankle breaks because you're not going it's just like doesn't come along with you i ate it today i kind of yard sale that coming down

the trail, luckily no one was there to see it. Yeah, that's the one thing you got to watch out for with this. We would definitely recommend running in some trail shoes. Nick was going with the cloud monsters, which we love, but those could also be it, make great sleds. They're very sled. I've been surprised with how good they are, but I think it's just because in general, this snow, just because it's a little wet is very grippy. It's a little sticky, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Cool. Okay, so let's get on to questions. We have so many really good ones, some intense ones, some light ones. but this first one here is a great way to start. Hi, TTL team, just watched the latest video and was interested to see you testing wetsuits for the 2024 season.

This got me thinking about various questions about sponsors. Do Paula and Eric ever disagree when you're testing brands to be sponsored by? There are certain products you prefer or have a shorter contract on to have the flexibility, or is longer always better for the security? Is there a performance product

you want to be sponsored by but are not? Sorry for the multiple questions. Feel free to pick one if that's easier. I'm not involved in any sponsorship stuff. Just find it an interesting topic. Hope you have great seasons. Sam from London. This is super fun.

I feel like we could go on this question for like 20 minutes. Yeah. Why not? Because there are like five questions inside of it. Yeah. So the first one here is do Paula and Eric ever disagree when testing brands to be sponsored by? Yes.

Not often, but yes. And it was tough last year because it was one like pretty significant sponsor that Eric wanted nothing to do with, and I was excited about, ultimately, we didn't do it. But that rarely happens because, I don't know, we like the same things the brands we're aligning with are very high quality stuff that we like and that we've tested. I guess at the end of the day, we don't have to be sponsored by the same company for a category, like Eric wrote Argonne for a long time while I was on Specialized. And that was totally fine.

It just ends up being a little bit more work for splitting the content between showing Argonne enough and showing specialized enough. So it really simplifies it, especially with Eric being the main content creator in our relationship to have the same brands for both of us. So that's kind of what we've trended towards over the last couple of years. It also just seems not fair to me. Like if I'm a whatever, let's say a bike brand, I'm like, great, I'm just going to sign Eric and then Eric's bike is going to show up in the videos but Paula's fans are going to watch

those same videos and we're going to get more exposure than we would normally with one athlete. So I feel like it's not, it's a little unfair to you guys when if like say a company says, no, we only want to sponsor one person. Well, I'm only sponsored by on. Yeah. And I. And Eric wears Solomon's all the time. Totally.

But when people who are a fan of let's say Eric's Extera and Eric's mountain biking stuff and they watch the videos, they still are seeing a person where. on and like companies pay for that kind of visibility. I do think probably quite a few people out there think I'm sponsored by On. I'm not and that's okay. Like they take good care of Paula and we're, you know, it's fine. Like in the shoe category is like one category where how you feel about the shoe and how it fits and everything is super, super important.

Whereas I say there's probably like between Paula and I like four bike companies out there that we would be fairly excited about. For me, I made to switch from Argon to specialize because of a mountain. Argon's didn't have mountain bikes. And it so happened to specialize was on my very short list of bike companies that I liked. If Bala had been sponsored by

20 of the bike companies that I'm not interested in, I wouldn't have had that conversation. I wonder, you guys, this reminds me of something you said about, like, recommendations, advice to newer pros and establishing themselves as a

having like an identity. That's not just I'm a triathlet and I do races. So you kind of get into the situation where brand A might be, might have a fantastic product, but maybe it doesn't really fit into this persona and this kind of texture that you have around you as an athlete. Yeah, I would say we're probably significantly more picky than most pro athletes around like the branding and the look and the feel of companies, even if they have a product that we're pretty excited about if their logo, for example, is just awful. It wouldn't be about the logo. I mean, that's just like an example.

But, yeah, like, we do feel like we want to align with companies that have product, people, and a culture that really aligns with who we are. And then it feels like a much deeper relationship. When they bring you ideas, it feels like an idea that you might have had yourself for content. It's very fluid. And that rolls into the next question about the duration of contracts. We would definitely prefer longer contracts. Two years, three years. The only downside of that is

if suddenly I won a world championship and my value is higher, but I'm locked into a certain number that I signed last year. But I mean, even if I won a world championships, I don't want to go and change bike sponsors. I don't want to go change kit sponsors. I don't want to change running shoe sponsors. So I think it's okay and it's really nice to not have to go through the negotiation process every single year and just have like a two or three year set contract so that that is just off our plate in the fall. We don't have to worry about it. And it definitely fosters like stronger relationships with people. And the way we operate is we don't have a manager.

We have personal direct relationships with each of the brands we work with. And I think that they like that and they feel like they want to. re-sign us when the time is up without much convincing required, which was our experience this year. It was really nice. Every contract that was up, they wanted to renew it. So, yeah, it's better to have longer usually, but the one year does give you the flexibility to, like, maybe ask for more money if you are worth it. The thing is, when you say, like, you could win a world championship, the nice thing is that a lot of your contracts have bonuses built into that. So you kind of still get that. Totally. And the bonuses for a world championship.

are good. Actually, a couple of my contracts roll that bonus into the next year's base salary. So it's like even more incentive to do a little world championship. They never go past third place, though. The bonuses? Yeah, like fifth. I don't have bonuses beyond third. Yeah. It's uncommon. It's, yeah, probably.

Or not existing. Yeah, ultimately the company is paying you for something that's significant in terms of visibility. and once you go beyond the podium of three. Yeah. Do you think there's any athlete that would or a certain kind of athlete that would value a shorter contract? Like someone that's brand new or something? Yeah, maybe. I mean, a newer athlete might sign a contract for product only, which I would advise against because I feel like that.

What does that mean product only? Like you're not getting paid anything and just getting like free wetsie or whatever. But then you're locked into that and you can't leave if a better offer comes. But yeah, when you're just starting, if it's like $5,000 for the year and you just do one year because next year you might be worth 15 or whatever, you know? That's really the key there is it's like how confident are you, because it's a gamble. How confident are you in that what you're signing is going to be considered low at the end of next year? Or are you unsure? Like, if you get injured and you're only able to race one time, you can be worth less at the end of the next year.

So you're gambling there, essentially. Yeah. And the third question was, is there any brands we want to work with but aren't? Yeah, we're freaking dying for a sunglasses sponsor. And it's also ironically the thing that we get asked about the most. Yeah. In this last week, we have received four messages. What sunglasses are those?

I'm like, ugh. Yeah, so I... Here's what they are. I think my plan for this year, maybe Erics 2, is just to buy whatever we want to wear and wear it. I really like the look of Smith glasses. We would really enjoy being sponsored by Smith for a lot of reasons. It looks cool. Did you hear that?

Smith? Smith, are you out there? Still waiting on that? Smith is cool. Pock is cool. I remember you talked about this. 100% is cool. 100% is cool.

But there is a list of companies that just won't sponsor us. 100% is on that. Right. But whatever. I think they're cool glasses. So yeah, that's the category. And then also wetsuits. We don't have a sponsor this year.

We really like the DeBore company people, but the wetsuits just don't fit us. So we left that contract. And now we're just kind of like free agents and trying a bunch of wetsuits. And that's been kind of a fun process. And we're hoping that whatever wetsuit we end up liking the most, like the orca or whatever it ends up being, we can start a relationship in 2025. And for people who want like a little bit more of that, Eric's working. on a video that's going to have some wetsuit testing, kind of like a wetsuit faceoff, trying to be as impartial as we can be.

Well, we don't have to be partial to any wetsuit because we're not sponsored. No, I know. But I guess what I'm saying is there's like maybe an emotional connection to one brand versus the other. And we're going to try to make the person swimming not aware of their times. They're just swimming, whatever it is, as hard as they can. And they're like, whatever, I'm just elaborate right now. And then at the end, we'll look at the data.

Yeah. A lot of wetsuits comes down to the comfort and. fit and how well you can breathe and how confident you are in it. And most that we've tested so far have been good. So yeah, it'll be interesting to see. Yeah, like my theory is that the suit that we like swimming in the most will ultimately be the fastest suit. But we're by not allowing the person doing the testing to like know at the time, we don't want to have this like positive feedback loop necessarily. But it would be awesome. Obviously, we like swimming in suit X. And it turns out to be 0.1 second faster over 100 on average. You know, like that's obviously the dream.

Eric, when do you think people can expect to be able to watch that? Ideally, we are filming it tomorrow and it'll be coming out this weekend. Oh, on Sunday. Yeah, barring any sort of complications. And if not this weekend, the following vlog the next weekend. Okay. Awesome. That'll be fun.

There's no rush, really. Like, we're not racing until a couple months from now. But, yeah, whatever. No, it's just a simpler process to go through with Nick here. That's all. That's true. That's true. Yeah.

Then you don't have to, I can shield both. your eyes like horses with blinders on. You guys just swim. Do not look at the clock. Yeah. Okay. Next question here. Hello, all. How do you keep water? Oh, my gosh, this is going to be an inflammatory question, Eric. This is going to bring back some trauma. Hello, how do you keep water out of your ears? I cover my ears with my swim cap to prevent water from flowing in, but sometimes water still gets through. Do you wear ear plugs? Sorry if you've already answered these questions. Oh, Kelly. Yeah. For the keen podcast listener, you know this has stirred quite a bit of

emotion in the past. You guys never have problems with this, right? If water goes in your ears, wear some ear plugs. Wow, Eric, you've really turned a new leaf. I barely recognize you anymore. It doesn't bug me when water goes on my ears, really. I've had it happen last year where on some swims my ear starts to hurt. And I can tell that it is the water. But when I, like, I like to have my swim cap over my ears, beanie over the ears, swim cap over the ears so I can just have less of a claustrophobic kind of sense. I feel like you're hearing really is a big part of that. And then when it starts to hurt, I do put it over my ears and it stops hurting. But Kelly- You wear your swim cap? Just like half on my ears. But my ear canal is exposed.

Yeah, same. You do the same thing, Paula. Oh, okay. Oh, okay. But if you had your swim cap fully over your earlobes, you'd look weird. You'd look like a potato head. I bet it's fastest, though. Is it not?

Just like you don't want earlobes flopping in the water. I just think there's like there's a point where that's so low that then like your neck is pushing the swim cap up. It just ends up at like half ear. But Kelly, to answer your question in a more abbreviated way, there are ear plugs made specifically for swimming. So they kind of like mold to the shape of your ear and they completely fix this problem. The only thing is that they kind of feel a little funny. And we'll make fun of you.

No, they're so cool. Eric. Eric just want to get canceled again. I can just feel the email anecdotes coming right now. Kelly, just to catch you up when this was Eric was very against earplugs and people were furious about it. We got so many messages. Like personally offended.

Yes, yes. They're like, I wear earplugs for medical reasons. It was like he said something. something that was completely like not kosher, you know? Yeah. But I completely prefaced it with like, if you got a wear earplugs for some medical reason, then okay, but nobody that I grew up with wore earplugs. That's what I said.

I love it. I love when Eric gets a little stirred up here. I think even like Speedo makes ear plugs. Oh, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

Next question here. And this is a coffee question. This is from Van in California. I have a Breville Duo Temp Pro machine. Pretty entry level, but decent. I use a, I don't know if this is spelled correctly, 1Z preso, 1spresso, 1spresso, 1spresso, okay, 1zpresso manual grinder for beans

and buy good beans from a local roaster. My issue is that I feel I'm not getting as much flavor from my espresso that I think I should be getting. It may seem obvious, but do better machines pull better shots, maybe the extraction process. If so, are there any decent machines in the $1,000-dollar range?

Shri-Lamar-Mor-San, dollar-sign, dollar sign yes of course thanks for all you do for us amateurs and everything fan so this reminded me of something that Olaf who's like a christian's coach christian bloom and coach was never heard of any of those people oh yeah ohlaf the uh the snowman and frozen oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah but eric i'm curious what you have to say and then i'll i'll kind of like regurgitate what i heard olaf say um on on this topic what was the grinder a one's Just one Z-presso manual grinder. I think my initial thought is maybe the grinder could have more to do with it?

Yes. And how hard you... That's a nice grinder, though. How hard you tamp it down? Is that the right word? That's a manual grinder. Yes. It's a manual grinder.

It could be to do with the beans, too. There's a few different 1Z-Presso manual grinders that I'm looking at with a varying price range. But typically the quality of your grinder, has a lot more to do with your extraction and the quality of your espresso than the actual machine. Yes, a $6,000 espresso machine is going to pull a better shot than a $1,000, but if you have a $200 grinder across both machines, that's going to be the bottleneck by far. So I remember Olaf talking about the different way, like the different processes that then affect the final cup of coffee. And I was surprised at how much importance is put into certain things like

the grinder, which I'd feel like it's such a no-brainer. You just grind the beans. What's the problem? But no, it's apparently super important. What he was saying is that if you don't tamp it down the right pressure, if you don't have the right fineness of ground beans, if you don't have the right amount of water pressure or water temperature, which you can get in the actual like a puck there is like a hole that goes through the middle, that the water doesn't... It's called channeling. Yeah, channeling, exactly, which I feel like is a great way to illustrate what actually happens there, the water finds the path of least resistance instead of actually going through all of the grinds.

Exactly. And a higher quality grinder is going to have a higher level of consistency across the grinds from the time it starts grinding until the time it ends grinding. You're going to have clumping. So a way that you can like get around this a little bit is by getting one of those crazy little. Sturry things. Sturry metal looks like a torture device.

And look at all those head massages that used to have. That's what it looks like. So if you try to do the manual grinder thing or you just have a lower quality grinder, you can give a little stir with that and that'll help redistribute things. So for this person, they could probably just keep the machine they have because that's okay. But maybe buy a $400 grinder. That's not the manual kinds because it also is just a quicker experience too. Yeah, the grinder that we had that we really liked was the Eureka Mignon Selenzo.

They have one step up from that that has a digital screen on it, which I would have done at the time. a couple months later, but the Salenzio is a manual knob that you twist. It still works, but and I think that's a pretty good bang for the buck grinder at like 450 bucks. Is that grinder? Was it very quiet? Yes. The silencio in Italian means quiet. Yes, that's exactly why it's called that. Then that was a big selling point for us. We didn't want to make this crazy ruckus every morning. Yeah. So, Van, maybe keep the machine, buy a fancy grinder, and then come back to us and let us know if that's worked. I wish there were like a, you know how you can certain bike shops let you test saddles before you buy them?

I wish they were a grinder testing thing. So you could be like, oh, it does taste better. If you live anywhere near Portland, you can go into Clive coffee in Portland, which is where we bought all our espresso stuff. And you can pull shots on a $10,000 espresso machine, a $200 espresso machine. They probably have a place like that in most like big cities. Wait, where does this person live? Van from California. Yeah, California. That's a large area. Yeah. But in like a big city, I think you could find a coffee specific espresso shop. Anyway, next question.

That's really cool. Good luck, Van. Let us know. Next question here's from Tom in Faram, UK. Hello, I love the podcast. I think my brain has formed a synaptic link between the feel-good vibes of getting to the end of the working week and the podcast. I think that's a Pavlovian response. Oh, yes. It's like, you hear the podcast music and all of a sudden you're like, you're just chill out. Yes, that's right. Okay. My question is about long rides on the trainer. know the weekly long ride is probably best done outdoors. But when the weather is too awful to ride

outside and living in merry old England, sometimes we get one week of nice weather per year and loads of people get sunburn. It makes sense to go indoors. For example, surely a four-hour zone two long ride inside is very different than a four-hour zone two long ride outside in terms of actual consistency of effort and pushing those pedals around. How equivalent are they? For example, is four hours in Zone 2 indoors equivalent to a much longer outdoor effort, or do you deliberately incorporate more pedal brakes indoors to reflect the inconsistencies in effort? Traffic downhills, donuts, tops, etc., of riding outdoors. Thanks for everything you do for the community. Tom, it's funny, this is very apropos since you guys just have been suffering through these

indoor rides in the past week. Yes, I've just been nodding really hard. Well, our coach, Paulo, really understands the mental drain of indoor riding. So he never prescribes, like, any indoor rides over two and a half or three hours. Because there's a limit to what you can tolerate, not just for the long ride, but then to go back on Monday and do another trainer ride, another trainer ride. So when you're doing, like, over 11 hours on the kicker in a week, it's a lot. So he kind of makes these workouts that are intense but shorter. And it's really hard to say whether, oh, four hours outside equals three hours inside. And like, who really cares?

Like, what's the effect you're getting? It's leg fatigue. It's endurance. Well, because when I do a four-hour ride in California, at least 35 minutes of that is descending and I'm not pedaling. Yeah, but you're on your saddle, getting bike skill practice. I don't know. It's hard to compare. This is where kilojoules come into play.

So, Paula, you stood prescribe workouts to us based on kilojoules. He still does it every once in a while randomly, but he would like write 2,000 kilojuel ride. And if you do that on the trainer, you're going to finish that in two hours. You can do that outside. You're going to finish that in 245 or however long it takes you and you can spin as slow as you want, just knowing that it is going to be a long, long day. Yeah, it's a metric of like work. It's nothing to do with calories.

And it doesn't, I mean, you can convert it to calories, but kilojoules only looks at actual effort, right? It doesn't look at your basal metabolic rate. Right. So if you stop pedaling for an hour, your cancer. kilojules go nowhere. Yes. Right. Exactly.

It's like power over time. Yeah. So if I'm doing 250 watts consistently for an hour, I'm going to hit X kilojoules. You know, but if you coast down a hill, then, you know, accumulating. That's a really good answer to this question, though, I think. Yeah, if you want to compare the kilojoules, yeah. And what's funny here about asking when you're on the trainer, do you intentionally take breaks or something? That's a funny, like I would think the opposite maybe, like when I'm out doing.

just so I'm actually getting a better workout. I pedal down hills too. But on a trainer, one of the beauties of it is that you never have to stop, which is maybe a double-edged sword. I think it makes you really strong. Yeah, it makes you really strong. Yeah, I would say this is where you could, like, Zwift would really come in handy for, like, decreasing the mind-numbing nature

and just look at the screen and ride like how you would outside. If you're going uphill almost all the time on Zwift, like, I sit up when I start going up hill. Just instinctively, right? And the power cranks on. And like, if it really cranks on, then I stand up for a minute. You know, just like take advantage of that and think about it like you're outside. And you guys are sponsored by Zwift, but you would be using Zwift no matter what.

Yeah, we were using Zwift for a long time before we got sponsored by Swift. Yeah, yeah, cool. Yeah, that's an interesting question. I do think the Killedjol's is such a, I didn't think of that at all, but it's such a perfect. I hate Killedjual rides because when you are doing them outside, they take forever. Right. See? Especially if you're the kind of person that doesn't pedal down a hill or whatever it is.

Or you mountain bike. Okay, well, let me ask you this then, kind of irrelevant to this, but what does a four-hour outdoor ride feel like indoors? Would you say three hours? Maybe, yeah, in terms of your leg feeling. In terms of the mental, what you feel like you have had, how much of your soul has escaped your body? Yeah, right. I would say often it's almost half. Like riding my bike for two hours outside is like an hour on the trainer.

Like the number of times I've looked to see how long I've been going is the same for an hour indoors versus two hours outdoors. And that's what I feel like you're right. Like the amount of times you've checked how long the ride has been going outdoors is probably the same for two hours as it is for one hour. You've checked like 10 times. That's exactly what I'm saying. Yeah. Brutal. Brutal.

But the training effect is not double when you're going to get. No. No. It's probably more like 20 percent or something. 10%. And if there's coffee shop stops too, of course. Yeah, it's so many factors, like where you live, how hilly it is, how many people you're riding with, how many, you know, how many, just, yeah, your group. Yeah. Okay, next question here. Hi, Penf. After the discussion on the pod last week, my question has to do with spring training

camps. Aside from nice weather, what else do you look for in a location? Wide bike lanes and plenty of trails, well-maintained Olympic-sized pools with scenic mountain overlooks, fantastic Mexican food. It seems like everywhere is so expensive these days. Thanks, Joe, from definitely not Tucson. I feel like everything he was saying there is like Tucson. Got wide bike lanes, you got good Mexican food, you got to get pool. That's why people go there. But why it has gotten so expensive.

That's honestly the deterrent for us to go there. But it's not just Tucson. Everywhere, yeah, but California's always been expensive. But you go to Tucson and it's like $5,000 for an Airbnb for a month. Is that an expense that we're willing to... I don't know. We just love our house. We love our setup.

It's easy and simple and we're happy here. And it's really hard to pack up and drive for 30 hours and pay $5,000 for a month. You know who doesn't charge $5,000 a month? Nick's Airbnb. I'm considering that, Nick. I'm considering just... The street in front of Nick's house in Santa Monica. Yeah, we sleep in our van at Nick's house.

Yeah, that is fun. I like that idea. that Tucson is a little better for triathlon training than Santa Monica. It's way better. It's way better. Of course it's better. The biking is not as good. Well, it's not as fun. Like Santa Monica biking is way more fun, but it is as good. Yeah. Yeah. The struggle with Tucson is like the bike path is whether or not you like the bike path and how comfortable you are with like flying down the bike path at 20 miles an hour and there's like kids and strollers and stuff. because if you stay in Oro Valley where the pool is, you're what, like an hour plus, hour and 20 minutes of bike path time

to get to Mount Lemon where everybody goes and like Gates Pass is a little bit closer. So if you stay closer to Mount Lemon, then you're an hour and 20 minutes from the pool. That is the struggle with Tucson. Is it so sprawling? It's hard to even know where in Tucson is the best place to be. I will say it seems like you guys don't really take advantage of this,

or at least you haven't talked about it. Correct me if I'm wrong. But the gravel riding there is incredible. There's a lot of great gravel roads outside on the edges of the city. Again, you're driving a bunch to get to that. And when you're trying to do a training camp, you need to minimize the car time as much as possible. Yeah.

Yeah. When we're there, we'll take a weekend trip down to Patagonia and drive gravel because we can drive an hour and then do a bunch of stuff and then drive back home. But it's the like we would love to do San Diego. the last time we were in San Diego, anytime we wanted to run soft, we had to drive 45 minutes, anytime we wanted to ride on our TT bikes, we had to drive 45 minutes, you know, assuming there was no traffic. You spend a lot of time in the car in California.

Yeah. But this has worked in the past. If anyone has a rental place in somewhere that's conducive to triathlon trading and a little warm, where we could drive with Flynn, let me know. It's not that we don't want to pay, is just that we don't want to pay the Airbnb fees. That's true. That's true. That's true.

Those Airbnb fees are brutal. And the cleaning fees. Like I clean better than whatever cleaners come in. Right. Fala is a cleaning machine. That's really true. But to answer this question, other than great pools, great places to run, great places to bike. Is there something else that you think is unique to you too when you're looking at a place? Yeah, we really like one good coffee shop, maybe two. And what city doesn't have? Yeah, that's true. And we like a place where we can be off leash with Flynn. That's the big one. is hard in anywhere deserty with cactuses. Or Santa Monica, you just, there's no place. Yeah.

Flynn can't be awfully. She hates Santa Monica. He does. Yeah, honestly, we've talked about this like every other day for a while now. It's really challenging to find a place where you feel comfortable on the roads and has all these things in the pools and the, et cetera, et cetera. So always on the lookout for the next spot, though. Yeah.

And then the conclusion we come to is capable to stay here and rides away for four hours. Yeah. Which make, I don't know, everything around that four hour, ride is better here. Yeah. But it's the ride. Like I saw Paula, I went to go fly the drone and Chevlin and then I was driving back. I saw Paula walking Flynn and I just rolled down the window and she was like,

you want to come walk Flynn with me? I just lost part of my soul on that indoor ride. Yeah, it would have been a little better outside. Okay. Next question here. Thanks, Joe, by the way. And hopefully Tucson treats you all this winter. Hopefully you have a guest house behind your house.

Oh, yeah. That'll be nice. Next question. This is from Caro. Hey Paula, Nick and Eric. I've only recently started listening to the pod, so I'm unsure if this topic question has come up before. I'm still happily working through your 100-episode catalog,

so please disregard if this has already been covered. We have covered this a little bit. Actually, we kind of dedicated an episode to it, but I still think it's a really interesting topic. My question is regarding managing the menstrual cycle during intense training blocks and for events. During my luteal phase, I suffer from severe fatigue,

which makes training very challenging, and I'm concerned that if this phase falls on my Ironman 70.3 event, it will significantly affect my performance. After so much training, it would be devastating for something out of my control to have such an impact on a highly anticipated day, and I imagine for pro athletes this must be exacerbated by the pressure of having to perform at such a high level.

Paula, as a pro athlete, how do you manage this? I appreciate that this is a personal question, so please don't feel obligated to discuss. So just in case you don't know, I'm not sure I didn't know this, but it begins around day 15 of a 28 day cycle and ends when you get your period. That's that phase. The Luteal phase? Yes. I am so bad about tracking that stuff. I have no idea what phase I'm in. Right. But do you know, like, I'm going to get my period in 10 days or something?

Not to the day, but like within a couple days, yeah. But I used to never even get it. So it's like not an issue. And now it's like regular. issue. Why were you not getting it? Yeah, that was an issue. It was a big issue, yeah. But it was nice to not have it. But now it comes every month. So it, I definitely get my period at races, sometimes like the day of, the night before, whatever. And it sucks. I get really bad cramps. But when I, I find that when I race with it, I usually movement and training and exercise helps and makes that pain go away. And I can still push through and get good watts and run really well. And I've won. races in that situation. So it's not fun, but it definitely is surmountable. And in terms of like the phases and the training and maybe like not paying attention is a good thing. I don't know. Like if you're too, if you're too analytical about, oh, I'm on this phase and I'm on this day and I'm fatigued and I don't know. I know Laura Phillips like tracks it really well and she does her strength training when it's in the optimal phase to lift weights and then recovers in times where it is better for the menstrual cycle, but I do not do that.

Yeah. I remember when we talked about this last time, I had cited a study that this, the sample size was very small, but the women that were tested did not perform. Their perceived exertion was higher, but their actual numbers were not. Yeah, I think that's my experience too. It feels harder to get a certain outcome, but it's not impossible. Yeah. And if anything, the motivation to do it is less.

so it's harder to get out the door for a workout or whatever it is when you're feeling that crappy. Yeah. But once you'd get out and do it, it's actually okay. It's funny. I have this memory of that first time that we went to, where were we? Oh, Santa Cruz. It's one of the first times we hung out. And I remember I was driving up and you're like.

Oh, I was in pain. You were in serious pain. So for people like, because I think there's a big difference. There's big swings in how much people actually experienced cramping in pain. Yeah. And you, I mean, it was like you were. curled up in a ball on the bed. Yeah, I haven't had that experience in a long time. It's kind of different every time. But like I said, when I go and move and walk and run a ride, it gets better. So that's kind of

my hack. And I take a lot of abby-profen if it's really bad. Oh, yeah. I'm not a doctor, but that helps me. Eric, are you not like, when I hear this stuff, I'm like, difficult thing to have to just like incorporate into your life every month. Oh, 100%. I get a front row seat to it and I do try to imagine how awful that would be, and I have no idea. But yeah, it's hard enough to do what we do if everything was normal and even keel and you feel great all the time, let alone just. Yeah, this is maybe a little out of my scope of advice, but I did at one point try taking birth control only for the reason of regulating it better so that I could, I don't know with birth control if you can like control when you're getting your period. I don't really

understand at all, but it was awful for me. I was like crying all the time. Worse mood. Very bad hormonal response to it. So I stopped. Do you remember that phase? We were together for that? Yeah. We were at Kathy's house. And I was just like, couldn't get out of bed. I was so depressed. I do remember that. Yeah, that was, that was rough. I was like, I would rather get pregnant. Oh, boy. Have a little Eric running around. A little long John Tiger. I think in that moment I would have preferred you to be pregnant too. Oh yeah, that bad, wow. So, yeah, that's interesting that for you, you do experience the cramps, but they're just an emotional and mental hindrance.

Physically, you feel like you can still perform. Yeah, I think if I'm tired on that phase, it's because of that, I'm attributing it to something else. I'm like, oh, I trained hard yesterday. That's why I'm tired. And I think a really good resource is Stacy Sims. She's, like, really big into female health and female performance around your menstrual. cycle and but like at an elite athlete level. So I think she's been on lots of podcasts. She has a book. Stacey Sims is her name. I've never met her personally. But my mom is always like,

you need to read her book. My mom praises her. I think she's so amazing. And it's applicable to a lot of women and athletes that are racing. We all deal with this stuff. So go to that spot for resources. Yeah. Very cool. Okay. Next question here is from Aaron in Arizona. We got a a few Arizonians. I don't know what the right. Arizonaians. I don't know what the right word there is, but Hello, I love the pod and especially loved episode 100. You all sounded so happy. That's right. I mean, we usually are happy recording the pod, but that was especially fun. My main question, does it bother the top level pros when the bottom level pros play a role in the race and pack dynamics? For example, if a person is a front pack swimmer and strong enough on the bike to hang on,

but then atrociously bad at running comparatively. atrociously bad at running. We were just talking about this. There's some pros that maybe know that they're not going to have a good race, but still swim and then bike very much affect the dynamics of the race and then are a non-factor on the run. They're completely entitled, though, to do that. They're allowed to do that.

Of course, they're allowed. But the question is, how do you feel about it? I would say the one thing that I have issue with is if you know you're not going to be able to run, like you're so injured that you know you're going to be able to complete the race, don't show up and impact the thing. If you just are a poor runner to go with this person's example, okay, like what do you expect? Like this person is working on their run that you got to start somewhere.

So what if this person you're talking about that's injured that can't run? I'm thinking, I'm trying to play devil's advocate here. They are like, well, my sponsors haven't seen me race this year yet. This is all I can do right now. It's showing up and glassing it on the bike. Confirming that you cannot run is a positive? Yeah, so that's not even good. Let me say that it's never a good idea to start a race when you know you can't finish it.

Yeah, a good idea is way worse than a DNS. Yeah, I would say. Correct. Because it's pulling out is not fun. But if you do it once, it gets easier to do it the next time. And you don't want to, you get into this weird mental head space on the run where sometimes you're like, oh, is it hurting? Maybe it's not hurting. I'll just push a little harder.

I'm so close to the finish. I'll just finish. And then it's worse, the injury. I'm talking about. So that's not a good idea. But I agree with what Eric said. If you're a super strong swim biker and your run is not your strength, you can completely be in the race for the swim bike.

What I would, what I hate is when the pro men. I knew it. When the pro men interfere with the pro women's race. That is not cool. So to use your own logic, though, if they're just doing the best they can to get the fastest time they can and they happen to intervene. with your race. Isn't that them just doing the same thing?

Well, I mean, like, if we pass a pro male and then he comes right in the pack, that's affecting the dynamic of the race. That's more bodies in the pack. And it's not his race. Easier for people behind him to draft. We were going faster than him. I caught him and passed. Like, that's intentionally interfering with the women's race.

Do you think it's okay for that pro male to latch on to the back of a pack of women? as long as he's not he's not really affecting your race but he's benefiting from you guys if a person does that then it's probably going to feel too easy oh and then they'll want to come around to the front and then it's too slow for it's so so your advice to a pro male who's getting passed by you and maybe a couple of other women is to what if that happens drop back don't try to ride with you don't definitely don't pass let let the ego go strong enough to go ahead that's totally fine. That should be what happens. Well, if you're passing them, then they're not strong enough. Yeah, then drop way back. I would say. I see. Eric, how do you feel about that?

100% agree. If you're getting passed by pro women, like, your race is for the most part over. Yeah, that's not happened one time at Oceanside. I passed this guy, like, on the hill, maybe 10K into the race, and it was uphill. I remember this. And he like, you know what? The drafting rules still apply when you're a female passing a male. Like, you need to get. buy them in 20 seconds or whatever it is. And he was like surging and wouldn't let me pass him. And I was like, hey, I'm here. I'm going to get a penalty unless you drop back.

And yeah, we all know you can surge at 600 watts to prevent me from passing you, but I'm moving quicker than you. And he was like, that's my race up the road. I want to get there. I remember. I remember. Bro, your race is 10 minutes up the road. Yeah.

Oh, ouch. Your race is not five seconds up the road. Anyway, that was. I'm usually like as nice as possible, but that was one point where I'm like, my race could be over if you don't stop g-hking around. Right, right.

Love it. I love when she gets fired out. So hot right now. Oh, man. Okay. Next question here is from Owen. Hi, all. I'm an OG listener. Oh, yeah, day oneer. From Wales, UK. I'm currently studying physiotherapy

at Cardiff University. I'm in my final year, which means lots of early mornings and late nights trying to write a dissertation and do hospital placements alongside my triathlon training. My coursemates think I'm crazy. Well, it sounds like you might be a little bit crazy. My question is this. As someone who one day wants to work as a physiotherapist with triathletes, is it normal for a physio to reach out offering to go on training camps or to go to races with pros? Do you have your own physio and bend and what qualities or additional attributes make some physios you have used better than others?

This is a great question. So if someone wants to be a physio for, let's say, endurance athletes in general, are there things that you found that maybe aren't so obvious that attract you to a certain type of physio? Temperament, availability. A lot of the time, the more experienced physios are better. But I think something Eric and I really like is ART, like, manual release of, like, tight muscles and stuff. So being aggressive when you need to feeling like we feel better as soon as we get off the table. I don't know.

That's the type of physio work that we like is like the pin and stretch and the ART. And it's almost like a very specific massage. Having an understanding of the sport, being an athlete themselves usually helps a lot. Yeah. I also like physios that kind of step into the how are we going to fix whatever the underlying problem is here. And I know, like, Paul has gone back and forth with this because you go in when you have an injury and you're like, I just want the injury fix. And a lot of physios will be like, okay, but first we're going to do an assessment and we're going to figure out all the stretches and like to, you know, develop you a whole plan when you just want them to like fix it immediately. But I do like having, having both and having a little bit of a plan.

It's like, okay, I'm injured. I can't run. But here's a couple of ankle exercises and some things that I can do that should theoretically when I come back and this tendon is fixed or healed, like be better. like be better. So I like that approach. We don't really have a dedicated physio and bend or anywhere, but we have a really good massage therapist. And for me, getting massage once a week is more effective than seeing a physio once a week, especially when I'm not injured and there's nothing really, really specific to work on. I think the full general massage by our massage therapist, Scott, who worked with the Canadian National Ski team, like really knows athletes. He's an athlete

himself. If there's something that's bugging us, he'll spend more time on it. You can tell he truly cares about it. He's not counting down the seconds till the hour is up or whatever, you know, he's like become a part of our team and would help us even if he's super busy, you know, that type of relationship where you can tell he cares versus like he's just doing it because he has to. Okay, so I'm going to try to make an analogy here. In music, if you're auditioning for a band. Let's say you want to audition for Taylor Swift and you want to be the drummer for Taylor Swift. Let's say there's a hundred drummers auditioning. Every single one of those drummers is good enough to play those Taylor Swift songs perfectly. They are way overqualified

for the gig. Nothing against Taylor Swift's music, but the drum parts aren't pushing the limits of what a drummer can do. So it really then comes down to not just the skill, but are they on time? are they nice to be around? Do they gel well with other people? Do they understand in the world of physios, what percentage of it is their actual skill versus all the other stuff? Yeah, that's a good question. The physio that traveled with me, like to the Olympics and in my ITU phase, she came to every training camp, every race. We just loved being around her. She was like our friend and she would help with other things besides just physio. So I think that's kind of part of the thing. If you're traveling with a team like this person's talking about.

And even Scott or massage therapist, you traveled with national teams as a massage guy. He's not just massaging. He's doing other logistical things with the team and helping out along the way. So you really form these strong relationships with the athletes and they completely trust you. And you're all often working with them in these really vulnerable moments where they're racing a world championship the next day or Olympics the next day. And they're fragile or they're nervous and just being able to calm. the nerves and say the right things versus just like fixing an injury is super important. And I think that's what I latch on to is someone that inspires confidence that I feel like

I can be around regardless of if they're working on me or not. And that's the type of person I'd want to bring with us to a race if we could ever afford that. Yeah, I think you really need to have all of those things if you want to be considered a world class and work with world class athletes. Like there's, yeah, if you are fantastic what you do, but you just talk nonstop about yourself, for example, like from the time I show up for my appointment, there are deal breakers, you know. This reminds me what we were talking about in the hot tub about editing video, about you can get really into a certain aspect of the edit without realizing that that's people don't, that's not actually what people care about so much, just the whole thing. So the physio,

you can be like, I'm going to be the best at ART. I'm going to be so, so good at it. But then you're like a total blank slate when you're in the room. Well, you'd better actually be noticeably the best. If you are so far away the best, then I feel like you can get away with that. This sounds a little bit like the Taylor Swift analogy where it's like, is it a lot of the physios are good enough to do what it takes. Maybe less so than the drummer thing. Like a really good physio, you might deal with some weirdnesses, some weird personality things. Just be like, wow, they've just fixed my hip.

You know, every time I meet them, they fix my hip. But short of that, it is like a whole package thing. A lot of the time, like the best physios in the U.S. or even in the world have worked with a world best athlete. And that has like strengthened their reputation. I remember in 2013 or something post-Olympics, I went to see Gerard Hartman, who was Paula Radcliffe's physio. And he was the best. Very good. So good.

And it wasn't just like you go in and see him. It's like you go to Ireland for a week and you're seeing him. times a day and it's like the super intensive rehab week and came out the other end uninjured. Wow. Like a miracle worker. Wow. So a lot of physio, unfortunately, I think comes down to just like experience. But yeah, if you can offer like a more affordable service, like come with us to our race

and we're not like paying you 10 grand or something. Maybe that's a good way to like build experience. I don't know. Cool. Okay, next one here is for, it could be a quick one. It's for Paula. It's from Chloe. Hi, Paula and Nick and Eric, but this one really is for Paula. I've just got a new trisuit which doesn't have a built-in sports bra. My last one did. Do you have any recommendations for bras that don't rub? I'm worried about the ones I have not drying quickly and chafing. Thanks so much, Chloe. I think the fit is the critical thing here, not the brand. I mean, I always race in the Lulu Lemon Y bra. It's like very minimal.

I wear it. I have like one of them and it's white and I wear it for every single race all year. Yeah. I don't know. I just can't. It does sound like if people's bodies are so different, though, that might be horrible for someone else. The fit seems like, like you said, like just like for us. It's more important.

Underwear or pants or sock. Yeah. What works for me may not work for Eric even. Yeah, and it's probably less about the brand of it too, but just getting one that fits appropriately. So maybe if you're not even like your cup size, for example, but like your chest cavity, your diaphragm width or whatever it is, like that's what has to fit. Like for example, I don't have big boobs, but I do have like a big chest. Because you're strong. Or I just have like a big rib cage.

I don't know. It comes from my mom. She has a big rib cage. But that definitely is more important than anything else, making sure that is not too loose or tight. That's interesting. Eric, we're learning so much today. Yeah, we are. Next question here.

This is an easy one. Hey, Nick, I check Strava quite a bit throughout the day and notice that I can never catch a blank Strava post from you. Even from big Strava creators I follow, I can catch the short window between when their watch or computer auto uploads to Strava and before they have had a chance to add a description or photo. Do you do something to avoid these blank posts or am I just unlucky? Thanks and rock on. Scott. Do you guys know what I do for this, by the way? Yeah, I used to do it, but it's a lot of work. It's work.

That's the only thing. I don't like it. I don't like that you do this. Yeah, sorry. There's a lot of things I do that you don't like. No, I wouldn't say a lot. I say, you're supposed to love me unconditionally. I do.

I do. I have them automatically set to private. So that they're only... Lynn does two for the record. Yes. Well, so the best. The two best Strava accounts on Strava. Yeah.

do this. I have it set to private so that when I have time, I go in there, make a description, put the photo up, and set it to public. It works great for me because I don't like that blank post thing. But you guys work out 17 times a day. And do you always rename your activities? Yeah. Occasionally, I'll just be really tired. And this is the problem with leaving it to private and then going back is like when you're like deep in a training block, it is so easy to forget. And a lot of times if I open up Strava and I see my own ride pop up saying morning ride, then I'll fix it. But if it was private, I don't know if it pops up the same.

I don't, yeah. Yeah. Also, I feel like if it's private, you're just like, it's easier to just keep it private. Yeah, yeah. I don't care as much about polishing the Strava posts or pictures or titles as much as Nick does. And Nick puts a lot more detail in his descriptions. Like, for example, today in the car, it uploaded.

I went on within five minutes and changed the title and put three pictures that were unedited. Yeah. And that's fine for me. but that's not the way you operate. Well, that's the way I feel like Strava should be. But I treat it differently just like I treat my Instagram differently. Yeah, yeah.

I'm a snowflake. I'm a special snowflake. A lot of the times I'll think of the title while we're doing the activity. Yeah, of course. That's what you do during the activity. Yeah. Or she just takes my best quote from the activity and uses it as a title. Yeah, but that word, don't you like that though?

Yeah, I like it. But then I have to leave mine as morning run. So whenever he's a good morning run from Eric, you know why. I feel like it's a good creative exercise, though. It's like, okay, I'm going to come up with something new an original, and it's not the same as the one I had last time. Last question here from Ronnie. Love the podcast. It's a part of my weekly routine, definitely a must listen. I'm an athlete and coach and was curious on how much time is spent on form review and improvements for swim bike run during

your training sessions. At the pro level, is this a part of your regular training or a non-topic? If so, how often do you address it? Many thanks for all that you do for the sport. For us age droopers, you are changing the triathlon conversation. Best Ronnie. Wow, thanks, Ronnie. That's awesome. Changing the triathlon conversation. That's cool.

Can we do something with that? That triathlon podcast. Changing the triathlon conversation. Wow. Okay, so it's funny that you asked this, Ronnie, because literally the last time we were at the pool, we did two passes of filming Paula in slow motion for her swim form, trying to figure out ways to improve her efficiency. And I'd say the last time we did that was six to eight.

months ago. Okay. So it's not that common. Yeah, but we do have a little bit of an advantage, or at least Paul has an advantage in that I film her swimming, you know, artistically every couple weeks. So there is a little bit more of a feedback loop there. I don't get to see myself swimming that often. Usually when I do, I can't believe it's me, but we don't integrate it in a structured way. And I think, correct me if I'm wrong, but you guys, you can't help it when you see yourself running, when you see yourself biking, you look at your position. You look at your position on the bike, you look at your form on the run, you look at your form on the swim, and you're analyzing. Yeah, yeah, totally. And not a bike or a run goes by where there's not some sort of a picture or a video or something of it, either on a phone or whatever.

So, yeah, I guess we do form check a lot. And I'll, like, form check when I run in front of the mirror on the treadmill and, like, when I run past the shiny window, just little stuff like that. Or, like, if the sun's behind me and it's casting a shadow, I can see if my right arm is flipping around in a circle. like a weirdo. Yeah, I do the same thing. So yeah, but not in like, all right, I'm going to run here and we're going to send a 45 second video to our coach and he's going to give us tips and just prescribe drills. We don't get into that deep.

Okay, I have a question for both of you. Do you think that your swim bike run form 10 years ago, has it evolved at all? Do you think it's very similar? Do you think it's potentially like, is the form check to maintain it, or are you still looking for improvements? Always looking for improvements.

I would say that for me anyway, things have changed a little bit just based on getting older, being just like hurting when we get out of bed for the first 45 minutes. And like my hip being all jacked up, my pedal stroke is not as fluid as it used to be. And just things like that. But it's not like we look like a completely different person, but we can tell. Yeah. So no, you wouldn't say you've made improvements or are there some small improvements in there? I do actually think I've cleaned up my arm carriage a little bit.

It's running. Yeah, just through the treadmill stuff and like paying attention to it and Paulo mentioning it every time he watches me run. And I am actively like trying and swimming all the time to be more smooth and breathe a little earlier and do all these little things. That's what keeps me entertained while we're swimming, you know, five days a week. But, you know, it's like all these things happen in very small increments. So it's not, it's, you know, like I just, I don't know.

It's hard to tell, but it's. It's fun to work on. Paula, what about you? Do you feel like your swim bike run form has changed in the past 10 years? I have no idea. Because Eric wasn't filming me 10 years ago. I don't know what I looked like. We watched some WTS races.

Yeah. No, I think I used to run much nicer. Oh, really? Oh, really? Not just faster, but your form. Okay, Nick. No, I'm saying because I feel like you do this a lot. You equate performance and results to something being good, which is not always true.

Oh, I see. Yeah. No, I don't know. I was, I feel like I was a little more fluid back then. Now when I see myself, I still feel fluid and I feel good and efficient, but I don't look the way that I think I look. Yeah. Which I guess a lot of people tell. That's all of us. Yeah. Like you took a video of me swimming the other day and I was like, oh my gosh. I felt like I was distance per stroke, wide entry, high elbow and it was just like a flailing orca. It's just so funny because you're a great swimmer. Eric, you're also a fantastic swimmer, and you say the same thing. You're like, wow. I love, we were just saying this, Nick. We love Eric's run form.

Oh, Eric, we were watching you running when you weren't there. Because all Nick's been doing all week is filming Eric run. And bike. I haven't even gotten one reel out of this visit. We attempted a reel and it just wasn't up to snuff. Because my run form looked atrocious. Because we're running in two feet deep snow, up hills. I'm like, like, Flynn.

Yeah, that's cool. I wonder if, I wonder if in 10 years from now what we'll say about our run forms and our swim forms and our bike forms. Man, if I can still be running in 10 years from now, I'll be pretty psyched. Oh, I think so. I don't know. It hurts. It hurts a lot. Well, maybe you won't be running X amount of Ks a week.

But maybe you'll be doing some trail running instead. Yeah. Yeah, I definitely will be. If I'm doing anything, it'll be trail running. I will say that this year or like this off season or whatever it's been, I've, felt very few niggles and pains. Yeah, you mentioned that. It's been kind of like the smoothest running.

Do you feel like you can attribute that to anything or a combination of things? No. No, it's just like consistency. Yeah. It's crazy. I think, you know, at first I was pretty critical of your strategy to take almost no days off in our offseason month. But I do think that doing like a little bit of running very consistently all offseason with no intensity might have. have gotten you just over the little bit of a hump of like these things that were inflamed?

Well, it was it. I forget what, I guess everyone knows this, but I was just learning about this that like your ligaments heal better, not with total rest. So maybe that's 100%. Maybe that's what was kind of happening. And also the off season, it's like no intensity. It's just all easy running, easy biking. You're still doing aerobic activity. But I think what really flares up my issues that I have is trying to run fast or trying to go really hard. in the TT position, all those things really mess at my ankle and mess at my hamstring, like these hot spots that really get bugged as the training gets harder. But in offseason, when you're just running, riding easy, that's why I think there's hope

for us in 10 years because we just won't be like doing super hard stuff. Yeah, yeah, totally. I think the best that I've ever seen you running was at the end of COVID. And during the COVID year, we were just going and running trails and Flynn was a puppy, and we were just having fun. And like we did a little bit of a tempo thing occasionally when we were. we felt like it or a QOM attempt, but you weren't feeling like every Tuesday and Friday, you need to run 320 per K in super shoes and, you know, you got a race coming up in two weeks.

That stress was not there. And it was, that's kind of more like how we ruled was this offseason. Yeah. I feel like doctors probably used to be like, your knees hurt, you should stop running. And I feel like we've come a long way since then. Now you see people like they're 45, 50, what years old, having your problems in doctors like, all right, see this physio, you need to strengthen like your hips. You need to start strengthen your glute mead and that'll help you. Like I feel like there's some clamshells. You'll be fine.

The clamshells do help. But I feel like that's the kind of world we live in now where it's like no, it is doable. You know, you just need to work on it. You need to work on your strength stuff. Maybe reform stuff, whatever. Totally. Okay. That's it, guys. That was it. That's it. Oh, wow. We did it. We did it. We're at one hour

and seven minutes on the counter. You'll probably edit it down to one hour. It'll get pared down a bit. We didn't really even mess up that much. this week. No, I barely had to, I'll barely have to do anything. I did skip a couple questions because I was afraid we were getting, we're going a little too long. Okay. Well, we'll pick up with those next week. Yeah. Nick's here for two more days. Tonight we're making pizza to satisfy his Italian blood. Yes, that's right. I can use that accent. It's my own heritage. It's been fun having Nick here. He's going to move here.

Even though Paula says that it feels like I've been here for a month already. Yeah, but it's fun. I feel like you guys are in better, great moods because they're, has someone to go fly drones with and I don't know, you're down for anything and you always want treats and it's perfect. The way that we've been talking about this and the way that you talk about it, it sounds like the only thing we do all day long is go fly drone, fly remote control drones and we're not being productive or doing anything at all. I have flew drones today for five minutes. Yeah.

I've been wildly productive while you've been here. Yeah. And it's been great. Good. Someone said there was a question that I don't even know if I put it in the list, but it was like, talking about our hobbies and passions and stuff. And like if we could have one thing. The holy grail of one thing.

Yeah. I didn't put that in. And to me, they said it to me like if you could have an at home donut chef or something. I'm like, there's more to me than donuts. I don't even like, Nick, you're the one that started the whole donut thing. You know what the funny thing is like donuts are great, but they're not in my like top three of like sweet treats. Yeah, I don't know why I have this reputation. I love cookies more.

It's because it's, I don't know, there's something that's a little funny. It's like Homer Simpson had donuts. They're super photogenic. So if we ever have donuts, they get a picture taken of them. That's right. Yeah. And I do love just like a regular chocolate dip donut. That would be my number one baked good treat.

But it's not like we get them maybe once a month we'll get donuts. Right, Eric? Okay. I get donuts more than once a month before being fair. Oh, you do. Yeah. Ball and I, when you're not here, like we do all our donating when we're with you. Yeah.

I do our donating with Nick. We're way more likely to go get burritos after something than donuts. But do you, okay, we'll finish on this because I didn't include this question. because I thought it was a little too. I struggled to come up with something for myself, which I guess is a good thing. But the question was something along the lines of, outside of triathlon,

is there a holy grail of thing that you want that would make your life great? And they use like, oh, Eric, maybe it's a photography thing. Nick, maybe it's a music thing. Paula, maybe it's the donut thing. And maybe it's because I live such a fantastically great life, but I couldn't even, I was like, I have everything I want.

like an e-bike to rip around Santa Monica would be fun, but I couldn't really think of anything. A material thing? It's a material thing. A material thing. A material thing. DJI Ronan 4D. That didn't take long at all.

A Smith sponsorship. Yeah. I will say that thing is amazing. Ronan 4D. I'll also take the long-range transmitter module. Oh my God. The whole thing. Their whole setup.

There's nothing in my, that I, a material thing that would make my life better. Nothing. But if I could go down the list of picking things, it's all house things. It's like I want a, if I could get cool art for the wall, it's like, art's like $10,000. Like, that's what I would do is just make the house as cool as possible. I would renovate the kitchen. I would get some cough drops. Cutlery for the kitchen.

It's like all adult stuff that I never would have ever even thought of. I think part of it. I think part of getting older, if you're doing it right, is putting less and less value on material things and just enjoying what you do. Like everything that I would want, I'm like, it's experiences, it's people, its relationships. It's not a new toy. As much as I love, like, tools for a job, I feel like I don't know. That's not where I place my value anymore. Totally. We did just buy home pods yesterday.

And they're amazing. We love them. We went to Best Buy and we were. we fell for the Apple ones. Yeah, they're good. All right. That's all pizza time. Somebody order pizza?

No, we're making pizza. Okay, thanks for listening. We'll chat with you guys next week. Bye. Later.